Wednesday, April 19, 2006

The Alarm

Just yesterday Shane ran into the room telling me to get my camera quick. Thinking that the library was on fire, the aliens had landed or Jesus came back and was holding a press conference I ran out side to see the weirdest clouds I'v ever seen. They were all bubbly and there were just rows of them. Crazy lightning too, it was pink. This was a shot I managed to get. You can't see the pink, but immagine the clouds flashing pink from one end of the sky to the other. Considering the storms that have been pounding the midwest it was really eirie.

I didn't dare take a picture bc it was too personal. Not to me, to the victims. We went and picked up the pieces of a house torn apart by a tornado a few weeks ago. The house was gone and what was left was burned to clear the land. Down a field from where the house used to be is where we went and helped. Garret described it best when he said we were working down where it looked like a T-Rex just ran through. I have never seen so many trees torn down in my entire life. It was just like someone sat the tree line on its side. The part that really go to me wasn't all the giant pieces of tin, not the log that was hurled through a piece of plywood. It was the muffin tin. Once you see something like that you realize this isn't a house that was wreaked it was a home. My mom makes muffins in a tin like that. There was parts of a stove, a shelf from inside an older refridgerator, bits of screen door, a little kids plush toy. Things we touch everyday at home. Shredded. Obliterated. Destroyed.

The worst thing I noticed while I was there. None of the churches helped... only the college. Now on Saturday I have two options. Cough Church is putting in a sound system, since I have knowledge of that kind of thing I would be perfect to help get everything squared away. The second is this: get up at 7 AM take a bunch of scrap metal toss it in a truck. It takes not special skill. Get cut. Tire myself out before I drive home. Bet sweaty and nasty. Bleed.... What would Jesus Do? Bleed. On one hand help a church bc no one in the church will do it. On the other hand help some stranger bc they need it. I wonder if our churches do that? I remember one church that spent thousands of dollars on upgrading their lights so they could better set the "mood". Perhaps, I will suggest the problem with church is church. We are infatuated with it. How do we improve our church. How can we change our church? Maybe we should change ourselves. Maybe it would be better for us never to enter the doors of church to praise, when we fail to praise out side the building. Frankly, I don't care if Cough gets a new sound system or not. I'm going to go bleed.